Casse gearing up with Kentucky Downs contingent

Mark Casse last year won at an almost 18-percent clip throughout North America. But only one of his career-high 235 victories in 2016 came at Kentucky Downs, a meet he targets and where he won five times in 2015.

But Casse remains undaunted and again plans to aggressively enter horses for Kentucky Downs’ five-date boutique all-grass meet that begins Saturday.

“The year before we had a tremendous meet. Then last year we struggled,” he said, adding in reference to turf-course condition, “So I don’t really know. Part of it depends on weather, I think.

“We kid all the time. We had a filly that should have won last time at Saratoga. She had a really troubled trip. I said, ‘Perfect; it saved her condition’ (for Kentucky Downs). I have horses all over North America, and the owners all want me to take them to Kentucky Downs.”

Casse plans to enter the 2-year-old colt Netas in the Fasig-Tipton Turf Showcase Juvenile, the seven-furlong stakes formerly known as the Kentucky Downs Juvenile and worth $350,000 with purse supplements for Kentucky-breds. He’s raced only once, finishing a close third with a terrible trip in an Aug. 17 maiden race at Gulfstream Park.

If Netas — owned by Robert Masterson, who campaigned Casse’s two-time champion Tepin — doesn’t get the Fasig-Tipton Turf Showcase because of an overflow field, Plan B is one of Kentucky Downs’ maiden races worth $130,000 for Kentucky-bred horses.

Casse is entering Moonlight Rain, who beat colts in winning a Woodbine maiden race, in Saturday’s Exacta Systems Juvenile Fillies, also worth $350,000 to horses eligible for Kentucky Thoroughbred Development Fund purse supplements, along with Bridaled Temper, a rallying second in her debut on grass at Saratoga.

Mississippi Delta, Casse’s lone winner last year, will try to repeat in the $350,000 Kentucky Downs Ladies Sprint at 6 1/2 furlongs on Sept. 9. She has been working superbly at Churchill Downs.

Hollow Point, beaten a half-length in a Saratoga allowance in his first start on grass, will go in either the $350,000 Exacta Systems Dueling Grounds Derby on Sept. 10 or the $250,000 Franklin-Simpson on closing day, Sept. 14. Perfect Partner, third in Saratoga’s restricted Curlin Stakes, would make his first start on turf in the 1 5/16-mile Dueling Grounds Derby.

Summer Luck, who had been a candidate for the Kentucky Oaks, looks like she’ll appreciate longer distances and will run in the $200,000 Dueling Grounds Oaks, also Sept. 10. 

One horse who won’t run at Kentucky Downs is Dream Dancing. She was penciled into the Dueling Grounds Oaks until she went out to California and won the Grade 1 Del Mar Oaks. Now she’ll instead target Keeneland’s Grade 1 Queen Elizabeth II Challenge Cup, Casse said.